Tuesday, August 02, 2011

Why Muslim Americans are most optimistic religious group -- Another Look at the Data.

The following article in regular print is a direct copy of what was published by CNN on the website on August 2, 2011 at 10 a.m. ET. Interspersed in the article in red italics I have added my comments and thoughts as I read this. Feel free to comment once you read it.

Muslim Americans are most optimistic religious group, study says

By Alan Duke, CNN

-- right away, my reaction was, "well, of course, they're winning more and more freedoms and getting their own way in so many decisions while everyone elses faith and freedoms are diminishing". Only CNN would put such a positive spin on these results.

(CNN) - Muslim Americans are more optimistic about their future than members of any other religious group in the United States, according to a Gallup report released Tuesday.
"They have generally optimistic and positive views about government, its agencies and the future of America,-- which government -- the one they want to eventually bring about, complete with Sharia law; is it possible they see America as having a bright future as a host site for a whole new Islamic State of America?but they report a significant level of prejudice and discrimination," said Ahmed Younis, an analyst for the Abu Dhabi Gallup Center.-- and of course they do not like any opposition to their plans and their Islamization of America; they see it all as prejudice and discrimination.
Nearly half of the Muslim Americans surveyed by Gallup said they have experienced racial or religious discrimination in the United States, according to the report, which was compiled by the Abu Dhabi Gallup Center from two years of polling.-- let me tell you who this group is from their own website: "The Abu Dhabi Gallup Center is a Gallup research hub based in the capital of the United Arab Emirates. It is the product of a partnership between Gallup, the world's leading public opinion research firm, and the Crown Prince Court of Abu Dhabi." Consider the source and the agenda.
"The American Muslim story is the American story in many ways," said Younis.-- Really? I didn't know. I think "Uncle Tom" and "Tom Sawyer" and "Abraham Lincoln" was the true American story.The report assessed the group's perceptions and attitudes and those of other religious groups toward Muslim Americans a decade after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
Polling of Americans of other religions supported the Muslim American perceptions of prejudice, Younis said.
"The opinion of Americans is still divided and the perception of loyalty of Muslim Americans is still questioned by a considerable portion of Americans," he said.
They express loyalty to the United States, but face distrust from a significant minority of other citizens, the report said.-- Please define 'loyalty'. Expressing loyalty is no measure of loyalty. Loyalty can only be said to have existed when one has to go against something that would otherwise not be natural for one to oppose unless they were loyal to something new. e.g. Greeks in America are loyal to America -- but let the U.S. go to war with Greece and see how many Greeks remain loyal to America. Another way of putting this is -- loyalty when only be noticed missing when one goes against the entity they expressed loyalty to. e.g. an employee remains with a company through many ups and downs for ten years or more -- he thinks he's loyal and so does his boss; then he leaves -- was he loyal? Of course not -- it's just that it suited him to stick around until he no longer could or until he could get something better. Let's not fool ourselves with our ability to measure 'loyalty'.
The polling found that 69% identified strongly with the United States-- see above
while 65% said the same about their faith.
"Muslim Americans are thoroughly American in their allegiance and identity and don't see a conflict between that and being thoroughly Muslim," Younis said.-- let's get real; if the Islamic leaders of the world aim to take over America as they say they intend to, of course, there's no conflict -- they get both America and Islam and an Islamic state complete with Sharia law.
Ninety-three percent of U.S. Muslims said they believe other Muslim Americans are loyal to the country, while significant minorities in other religious groups doubted that loyalty, the report said.
Thirty-seven percent of American Protestants and 35% of Catholics said they didn't agree that Muslims living in the United States were loyal to the country.
Nearly all Muslim Americans, 92%, said they believed that Muslims living in United States had no sympathy for al Qaeda, the terror group responsible or the 9/11 attacks.-- Agreed, probably true. But let the terrorists jihadists gain prominence in the United States and see which Muslims stand up to eliminate them or to turn them in. I don't believe you'll find any if we can go by how much moderate Muslims stand up to jihadists and terrorists in Arab countries.
They are, as a group, critical of counter-terrorism measures imposed since the terror attacks and a large percentage distrust the FBI, the report said.
There is evidence of "a big friction" between Muslim Americans and federal law enforcement, Younis said.-- do you think?
Just 60% of Muslim Americans said they have confidence in the FBI, compared to 75% or more of Americans of other major faiths, the report said.
While 81% believe it is not possible to profile a terrorist based on demographic traits,-- what a surprise! Maybe we should have asked them if they thought that Israelis or Zionist Jews living in the Gaza Strip or the West Bank would more likely be terrorists against the Palestinians than Muslims living there would be? Let's see what they would say then about profiling.
just 49% of other Americans agree.
"There's a significant percentage of Americans that believe racial profiling is an efficient way of conducting law enforcement activities," Younis said.
Attitudes about racial profiling are also reflected in what Muslim Americans say about prejudice they face. Sixty percent of U.S. Muslims say other Americans pre-judge them based on their ethnicity.-- I do not believe that anyone should be pre-judged based on their ethnicity. But I do believe that Islam is not just a religion -- it is a political movement and a religion combined. The only way for a Muslim in America to not be pre-judged is to "declare him- or her-self openly being against the elimination of any other race and the murder or hatred of any other religion". Sign that public list in the United States or elsewhere and then demand and get full American integration as a Muslim. I'd be the first to help many acquire that status. I would also expect a Christian to sign such a list and to the Christian list.
"At 48%, Muslim Americans are by far the most likely of major faith groups surveyed to say they have personally experienced racial or religious discrimination in the past year," the report said. "The next most likely are Mormon Americans, although less than one-third of U.S. Mormons say this."
Just 63% of Muslim Americans said they feel respected when they practice their religion in public. Eighty-one percent of all Protestants and Catholics and 85% of Mormon Americans said they felt respected.
"There is still a little bit of hostility in the public square as it relates to Muslim Americans and their place in society," Younis said.
Muslim Americans generally feel better off and more hopeful in 2011 than they were in 2008, when a similar Gallup report was produced. While 60% said they were thriving, about the same level as most major religious groups, they are the most optimistic about their lives in five years.
Americans overall rate their future a 7 on a scale of 1 to 10, but Muslim Americans rate theirs at 8.4, the report said.
Jewish Americans ranked as second most optimistic at 8.0, following by nonreligious, atheists and agnostic respondants at 7.9.
Mormans' optimism was rated at 7.8 and Catholics at 7.7, while American Protestants were the least optimistic about the future with 7.4, the report said.
One explanation for their optimism is that Muslim Americans were hurt more than other major religious groups by the recession and have experienced more improvement in the recovery, the report said.
The election in 2008 of President Obama, a Christian with Muslim roots, may be one factor in their optimism, the report said. They give Obama's performance an 80% approval rating, the highest of any religious group. President Bush's approval rating among Muslim Americans was just 7% near the end of 2008.-- surprise, surprise, surprise
With the exception of Jewish Americans, all other religious groups rate Obama below 50%, the report said.
Muslim Americans represent the most racially diverse religious community in the United States, the Gallup report said.
"For instance, Asian Muslims are easily the most likely in America to be thriving," it said. "Black Muslims report more financial hardship than do white Muslims, and black Muslims are somewhat less likely than other Muslims in the U.S. to be satisfied with their standard of living."
One "intriguing finding" of the analysis is the indication that "frequent mosque attendance might lessen stress and anger," the report said.
"It also takes away from the theory that mosque attendance stokes Muslims' anger and radicalizes them," it said.-- it all depends which mosque one goes to, doesn't it?
"Rather, Muslim Americans are no different from other major U.S. religious communities who appear to draw peace of mind from their faith."
The Abu Dhabi Gallup Center is a partnership between the opinion research firm Gallup and the Crown Prince Court of Abu Dhabi.

I think this is valuable information gathered by this group -- but let us be careful in how we interpret the results and also how we use them. Clearly there is a leftish social agenda here that cannot and should not be missed.

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